Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Krugman Nobel a political decision?

Economist Paul Krugman won the Nobel Prize the other day.

Krugman is much better known as the vitriolic anti-Bush New York Times columnist than for his work in economics. I am unqualified to really judge whether he deserves this Nobel - I would note that he won the John Bates Clark medal for best economist under 40 earlier in his career.

It is worth noting that the Nobel committee certainly has grown quite progressive, a list of 'politicized' winners of the Peace prize:

2007- IPCC and Al Gore
2004- Mohamed al Baradei
2002- James Carter Jr. [ugh]
2001- Kofi Annan
1993- Yasser Arafat

The most appropriate comment regarding Krugman's secondary career as a pundit (also applies to Frank Rich) is from the 1965 Nobel Physics Prize winner (HT: Tigerhawk)

"I believe that a scientist looking at nonscientific problems is just as dumb as the next guy."
--Richard P. Feynman *42

No comments: